Albus Dumbledore and the Limbo Conversation
by ZebJeb
Summary: Albus Dumbledore meets a different Harry Potter in the Limbo version of King's Cross, where he learns some disturbing facts and discovers a glaring hole in all of his plans for Harry.


Albus Dumbledore waited patiently in the white void that represented the mid-point between life and death. He knew that he was quite lucky to be given this opportunity, but Death had been kind enough to allow him this boon. While never mastering the Deathly Hallows, he had still held each of them at one point and willing given them up (while trying to prevent the Elder Wand from having a new owner), and Death was impressed by his willingness to not try to combine all three Hallows when he had the chance. All of this so that he could talk with Harry Potter when the young man inevitably sacrificed himself to Voldemort.

Time was not truly perceivable in this limbo state, and yet he spent his time here with hope brimming in his heart. If all things went to plan, Harry would both sacrifice himself to Voldemort and still manage to return to life. It was an admitted long shot, and Albus would certainly never bet on this succeeding. Still, there was a slim chance. Albus just hoped that Harry would touch the Resurrection Stone before the sacrifice, so that Albus could be brought up to speed on what had happened since his own death.

Gradually (and yet suddenly as well) the white void filled with an all-encompassing white mist. Through the mist, a shadow shaped like a person appeared in the distance. Albus approached and the mist began to dissipate, and the void began to take on some vague shapes. One of the few clear shapes was a bench with a disfigured wreak of an infant-like creature. That must be Voldemort's soul fragment.

That meant that the indistinct figure bending down to look at the soul fragment must be Harry. And since he had no idea what Harry had been up to, he supposed the Resurrection Stone had never been touched.

Albus spoke to the back of Harry, his honorary grandson's shape becoming clearer as he spoke. As he spoke, Harry rose and turned to face Albus.

"You can't help it. Harry, you wonderful boy. You brave man. Come… you're old!"

With the mist no longer obscuring Harry's face, Albus could clearly see that Harry was an old man. His hair was white as snow, yet still messy as it had ever been. His face filled with lines and cracks. And his eyes still held their beautiful green hue, while dancing with amusement.

Harry Potter was most definitely old.

* * *

Albus stared at Harry in shock, as Harry simply stared back with a patience that Albus had never known the boy to have in life.

"Harry, my boy, how did this happen?"

Harry chuckled before responding. "The usual way, Albus. One simply goes a long while avoiding dying, and eventually they find themselves a ripe old 153 years old. I believe you are familiar with the process known as aging."

"I apologize, my boy, but what I meant was… you should have died when you were much younger." Albus waved his hand in the direction of Voldemort's soul fragment. "As you can clearly see, Tom couldn't die while you were still alive."

As Albus realized what he said, his expression turned to one of pure horror. "Tom didn't win, did he? Has the war been constantly fought for nearly a century and a half?"

Harry smiled. "Oh no, Albus, Tom didn't win. At the end of what would have been my seventh year, there was a huge battle at Hogwarts. Tom gave me an hour to surrender to him, which I of course didn't take. I countered by challenging him to come and duel me in front of everyone. Obviously, he had his Death Eaters attacking everyone during the duel. But it turns out I was the master of the Elder Wand that he was using, so I ended up defeating him and sending his death curse back at him. Although, as you might guess, he wasn't fully dead. His spirit rose out of his body and vowed revenge before it flew off."

Harry smiled even brighter as continued to tell his tale. "As it turned out, it was the best thing he could have done for us. We had just had a major victory, with many of the worst Death Eaters killed, along with Tom missing a body, and his Nagini horcrux destroyed. But our side knew that we couldn't rest with his spirit still out there. So, we made sure that his supporters weren't allowed to slink back into their places of power and walk free to resurrect their master. It was tough work, but we eventually got a government in place that was mostly free of corruption and bigotry. Tom never managed to get his body back, and the remainder of my life was filled with happiness and more equality in the magical world than had ever been seen. If Tom had just died, I was told by many fighters for the Light that they were ready to end the fight and would have likely been more forgiving to the enemy, since they wouldn't have had the risk of Voldemort rising in the back of their minds. Heck, some of them said that they probably would have been willing to give the Malfoys a second chance, instead of life in Azkaban."

Albus wasn't sure how to feel about the story. It some ways, it sounded like a wonderful result. In other ways, it seemed like such a waste to not allow those on the losing side to redeem themselves. Not knowing where to start, Albus replied from a place he was comfortable with… guilt. He looked at Harry with disappointment and sighed (an unneeded affectation when one is dead) before he spoke. "Harry, that could have gone wrong in a thousand different ways. You risked a great deal by not destroying all the horcruxes. Didn't Severus share with you that you were a horcrux?"

Harry looked unrepentant. "He did share his memories with me right before he died. I watched them during the one-hour window Tom gave us. So, I was aware."

"Then, you knew the plan I had for you. Why did you take such an enormous risk, and ignore the plan?"

Harry shrugged. "For two main reasons. First, I couldn't fully trust the memory was valid. After all, Snape was a master occlumens, so it was conceivable that the memories were faked. Also, he could have easily used Polyjuice potion and got someone to look like you and have them read from a script. I certainly wouldn't put it past him to be so petty as to have a plan in place to get me to commit suicide."

Albus could not help but feel shocked at this. "Harry, my dear boy, surely you must have understood that Professor Snape was on our side all along. He would have never done such a thing to you."

"So, Snape's still a blind spot for you even in death, eh? Oh well. Like I said, I had two main reasons. The Snape reason was certainly in the mix, but it was not the main reason. Honestly, being set up to sacrifice myself seemed like such a Dumbledore thing to do, I did suspect it was indeed your plan. However, your plan required me having a great deal of trust in you. The problem was… I didn't trust you at all."

* * *

Albus was stunned. Of everything he expected to hear, this wasn't even remotely considered to be a possibility. Hearing that Harry didn't trust him was like… like hearing that magic was only a figment of his imagination. It was a statement that caused more pain than he had experienced in ages.

"You… don't trust me?"

Harry gave a pitying look. "Well… it may be a bit of an exaggeration to say I didn't trust you AT ALL. I did trust that you had good intentions. I just didn't trust you to be truthful… or to take care of my best interests… or to be competent as an educator, leader of the light, or fighter of Voldemort. I also didn't trust your ability to be light or moral. Oh! I DID trust your competence in casting spells and other academic things… if that helps."

Albus's face was a study in utter defeat "So, you trusted me to have good intentions and cast spells with competence. But, in all things including my morality, you had no trust?"

Harry winced. "Pretty much"

"What did I do to engender such a lack of trust in you?"

"Well… when it comes to truthfulness… you lied to me nearly every time we talked. And before you deny it, you need to realize that lying is not about saying things that are true or false. It's about presenting information in such as a way that you intend for the person to infer what you know to be false. My first year, you specifically told me you weren't going to lie. I asked why Snape tried to protect me, and you made me infer that is was because he felt a debt to my father. We both know that was nowhere close to the truth. So, of course I could never trust that you weren't excluding an important fact that would radically change the meaning of what you said."

"As for taking care of my best interests… do I really need to say anything more than 'The Dursleys'?"

Albus opened his mouth to defend himself but decided that arguing would be futile.

Harry continued. "When it comes to your competence, Snape is a big factor. You ignored the bullying that he both supported and performed personally. Every time anyone complained to you, you would simply give a response like 'Severus has my complete trust' and then dismiss their complaints as being overblown. Did you know that I talked with various people over the years to find out why they didn't believe you when you said that Voldemort was back? It turns out that nearly everyone said that your blind trust in Snape had massively eroded their belief in your judgement about who should be trusted. Before Snape, they say they would have likely believed you, but you let him destroy your good name. Every time you defended him, you were wagering your good name that Snape would act like a professional in the future. When he would immediately resume his bad behavior, your name lost a bit more value. So, when you said that trusted me, they just thought it was another example of Albus Dumbledore and his poor judgement in who to trust."

Albus felt defensive. "My boy, you surely must understand that Severus was important in his role as a spy. He needed to maintain certain behavior to keep himself in good stead with Tom."

Harry rolled his eyes. "And he nearly cost you the war because of that. Besides, he may have been a spy, but he was paid to be a teacher. You knew he was a failure as a teacher, but you kept him anyway because he provided value to you in an unrelated role. Since both you and he were paid to provide a quality education, and you knowingly refused to give the children that education, you stole from hundreds of children during his tenure. Hence me having no trust in your competence as an educator."

"When it came to fighting Voldemort… you hired him to teach me in my first year! Let's ignore your demonstrated inability to fight the war as a war, and all the other times he kept beating you with his incredibly convoluted plans. I can not stress enough… YOU… HIRED… VOLDEMORT!"

"To sum up the rest of the problems. Your morality and your position as a leader of the light. All the remaining problems can be boiled down to a simple fact. You spent 15 years of your life dedicated to ensuring I died at the appropriate time. Or, put in proper terms, you spent 15 years of your life dedicated to murdering an innocent child."

Albus's eyes widened in horror. "Harry, my boy, you have to believe I didn't want you to die. But there was no other way."

Harry just shook his head. "There were other ways. You just didn't want to get your hands dirty."

Albus felt his heart breaking. "I suppose one could look at my actions in that light. I am truly sorry you felt that way, my boy. I dread to ask, but did your friends also agree with your assessment?"

Harry's eyes widened with surprise. "I have no idea if they would have agreed with me. It's not like I trusted anyone enough to share my concerns."

* * *

Albus felt himself become shocked into silence once again. After a while, he finally spoke. "Surely you trusted your friends?"

Harry looked offended. "Of course, I trusted my friends! I… just didn't trust them to be more loyal to me than to your memory."

"So, you didn't share Severus's memories with anyone?"

"Not completely. I told them how he was in love with my mother. But then I lied and told them the last memory was of Tom rushing in and cursing all the Headmaster portraits and muttering something about it being just in case. I didn't know if your portrait would tattle, after all. I then scooped up the memories and destroyed them, again telling them the vial got smashed during my battle with Tom. Basically, I wanted to make sure that even if they suspected me to be a horcrux, there would be enough doubt to keep them from trying to kill me for the good of the world."

"But… certainly they had shown their loyalty to you enough times in the past?"

Harry snorted in response. "Every member of the Order willingly let me be tormented at the Dursleys, because you told them to. Their loyalty to you was clear. Ron had already broken my trust in 4th year when he abandoned me during the Tri Wizard, and rebroke it when he abandoned me during the Horcrux hunt. Hermione, in third year, was willing to reveal the existence of the Marauder's Map if I snuck out to Hogsmeade, proving she was willing to reveal my secrets and blackmail me if she thought the cause was good enough. She also refused to listen to me about Malfoy in 6th year and treated me like excrement over a book, which was ridiculous. And of course, they both followed your orders to ignore what I would want and didn't write to me the summer before 5th year, proving their loyalty to you came before their loyalty to me."

"Honestly, the only ones I could have possibly trusted at the time were Sirius and Luna. But they were both a bit too mentally questionable, so I couldn't trust them not to slip the secret out on accident. After Tom's defeat, there was no point in sharing my concerns."

Albus felt the sins of his long life begin to weigh down on his soul. "I am truly sorry that I was the cause of your friendships being destroyed through my interference. I suppose I only have one last question, why didn't you tell me about your concerns?"

Harry smiled kindly. "You didn't destroy my friendships. I couldn't trust them to take my side over yours, but they were still my friends. Once you were dead, that trust issue faded away into nothing. I just didn't share your theory about me being a horcrux. I found the key to happy friendships and relations was to just accept people for who they are and avoid the things that would cause a fight."

"And, why didn't I tell you? I tried expressing my concerns early on. You ignored them. When you let me compete in the Tri Wizard, you solidified my opinion that you couldn't be trusted. Initially, I was planning to just wait until I graduated, and it would no longer matter. However, once Tom was resurrected… well there were three factions. Tom, who was my enemy. The Ministry, who had shown themselves to be my enemy. And you, who was a somewhat ineffectual ally. I figured the best-case scenario of sharing my concerns would be you telling me some platitudes with no changes happening. The worst-case scenario was you deciding I am enemy or must be controlled, and then I would be fighting against everyone. You were a crappy ally, but I still didn't want you as an enemy since you had proven you were willing to do horrible things to me that you would never do to Tom. Luckily, your paranoia made sure that I was the only living person who knew that you believed I was a horcrux."

As Harry finished speaking, a train pulled up to the station that the void had resolved itself into. Harry looked at the train and then sighed happily.

"I suppose that is my ride to 'the Next Great Adventure'." Harry placed his hand on Albus's shoulder, giving a friendly squeeze. "It was… interesting talking with you again, Albus. I hope your train leads you somewhere nice."

Albus watched as Harry boarded his train and rode off into his Next Great Adventure. Another train pulled into the station. When the doors opened, he felt a compulsion to enter the train. As the doors closed behind him, Albus Dumbledore found himself doubtful, but truly hoping, that the train would indeed lead somewhere nice.


End file.
